Table cutlery is made in the following way. The blade is first rudely
fashioned from a flat bar of steel by the hammer and anvil, and this
is then welded to a bar of soft iron half-an-inch square, and cut
off, leaving sufficient to form the “shoulder” or “bolster,” A, and
the “tang,” B, fig. 1, which is first made by the hammer and then
beaten into a sort of mould or die. The blade is finished as far
as can be done with the hammer, made red-hot, and thrown into cold
water, which hardens the steel, and then “tempered” to a full blue
color (see “Steel”) after which it is fit for grinding. Razors and
penknife-blades are made of fine steel, and are forged and hardened
as above, but the tempering is effected by arranging them in rows
with their backs downwards on a plate of hot iron till the color
appears on their surface indicating the temper they have received,
which for razors is a pale straw color.
Cutlery is ground upon stones of different sizes, according to
the kind of article; for saws, and table-knives, which are to be
ground to a flat surface, very large stones are used, while razors,
which have a curved surface, and penknives, whose blades are very
narrow, are ground upon very small stones. These stones are driven
by machinery with great rapidity, and are arranged over a trough
of water, so that their lower parts dip into it, by which plan the
stone is kept wet; if it were used dry, the steel would get too
hot to hold, and the temper of it be injured. The article to be
ground is held at the top of the stone. When ground, the goods are
“glazed” by means of a wooden wheel the edge of which is smeared
with emery-powder, and finally, if they are to be polished (which
is only in the case of the finest steel instruments), they are held
to the edge of a wooden wheel covered with buff-leather, and charged
with “crocus”--this crocus is a red oxide of iron much used for
polishing all sorts of things, as it is both fine, free from grit,
and sufficiently hard.